Apparatus for travel support

ABSTRACT

A travel support apparatus sets a travel locus of a vehicle based on a gaze point of a driver of the vehicle. By utilizing the gaze point, the travel locus is calculated and set for the travel control of the vehicle, especially for a curved portion of a road, in a matching manner that the calculated travel locus approximates the travel locus created by the steering operation of the driver. The above locus calculation scheme generates a natural travel locus because the driver of the vehicle usually gazes at an exit of the curved portion of the road when he/she steers the vehicle on the road. The natural travel locus calculated and set by the travel support apparatus prevents the driver from having discomfort and/or unsafe feeling while the travel of the vehicle is controlled by the apparatus.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

The present application is based on and claims the benefit of priorityof Japanese Patent Application No. 2008-203410, filed on Aug. 6, 2008,the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present disclosure generally relates to a travel support apparatusthat sets a travel locus of a movable body and provides a travel supportfor the movable body based on setting of the travel locus.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

The method of setting a travel locus based on geometric information of aroad and performing travel control of a movable body traveling on theroad is, for example, disclosed in Japanese patent documentJP-A-H07-248819. The travel locus control method in the above documentis about a steer angle of a steering wheel based on a geometrically setlocus and a direction of a vehicle relative to the geometrically setlocus.

However, when the travel locus of the vehicle that is driven by a driveris set based on the geometric information, the travel locus does notnecessarily match a predicted travel locus that provides comfort for thedriver of the vehicle. That is, in other words, the travel locusaccording to the road geometry may lead to a discomfort of the driverwhen he/she performs the travel control of the vehicle.

More practically, if the driver is driving a vehicle and steering byhim/herself, the vehicle is steered to travel toward an “exit” of acurved road when traveling on the curved road. On the other hand, whenthe vehicle is traveling on a travel locus that is being set accordingto the geometric information of the road, the vehicle is notsufficiently steered toward the “exit” of the curved road, therebygiving the driver an impression that the vehicle is going to go off fromthe road; which leads to discomfort and/or unsafe feeling of the driver.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In view of the above and other problems, the present invention providesa travel support apparatus that suitably supports a driver of a vehiclewithout causing discomfort of the driver.

In an aspect of the present disclosure, the travel support apparatusincludes: a gaze point set unit for setting a gaze point of a driver ofa movable body; and a trajectory set unit for setting a trajectory ofthe movable body based on the gaze point set by the gaze point set unit.

In general, when a movable body travels a curved road, the driver of themovable body performs steering operation while he/she is watching aso-called “exit” of a corner, that is, an end point of a curved portionof the road. In the present disclosure, a gaze point gazed at by thedriver is set, and the travel locus is set based on the gaze point.Therefore, the set travel locus matches the travel locus generated byhis/her own steering operations, and does not lead to the discomfortand/or unsafe feeling.

Further, according to another aspect of the present disclosure, thetravel support apparatus includes: a position acquisition unit foracquiring, as environment information, a position of an object existingat a proximity of a movable body; a motion acquisition unit foracquiring, as motion information, a motion of the movable body; anobserved motion calculation unit for calculating, based on a retinasphere model that models a retina of a driver of the movable bodytogether with the environment information and motion information,observed motion representative of motion information of the object beingprojected onto the retina; and a trajectory set unit for setting atrajectory of the movable body based on the observed motion.

By having the above elements, the technique of the present disclosurecalculates observed motion representative of motion information of anobject that is projected on a retina sphere model of the driver. Thatis, the observed motion is defined as a translation of the motion of theobject to a recognized amount of motion by the driver of the vehicle.Thus, by setting the travel locus of the vehicle based on the observedmotion, the travel locus of the,vehicle is prevented from causing thediscomfort and/or unsafe feeling to the driver, due to the matching ofthe travel locus with the one from his/her own steering operation.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Objects, features, and advantages of the present disclosure will becomemore apparent from the following detailed description made withreference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a structure of a travel support apparatusin an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is an illustration of grid points on a road;

FIG. 3 is an illustration of a retina sphere model;

FIG. 4 is an illustration of eccentric angle variations calculated by acalculation unit and represented by a line segment for each of the gridpoints;

FIG. 5 is an illustration of a minimum variation point on each of thegrid point lines and a gaze point;

FIG. 6 is an illustration of a trajectory of a movable body converted torectangular coordinates;

FIGS. 7A and 7B are illustrations of discrepancy between a targettrajectory and a current trajectory; and

FIG. 8 is an illustration of a blind spot in association with the gazepoint and the trajectory.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The embodiment of the present disclosure is described with reference tothe drawing. FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a structure of a travelsupport apparatus 1 in an embodiment of the present disclosure. Thetravel support apparatus 1 provides support for a travel of a four wheelvehicle (i.e., a movable object), and includes an environmentinformation acquisition unit (i.e., a position acquisition unit in claimlanguage) 10 for acquiring, as environment information, a position of anobject existing at a proximity of the movable body; a vehicle behavioracquisition unit (i.e., a motion acquisition unit) 20 for acquiring, asmotion information, a motion of the movable body; an observed motioncalculation unit 30 for calculating, based on a retina sphere model thatmodels a retina of a driver of the movable body together with theenvironment information and motion information, observed motionrepresentative of motion information of the object being projected ontothe retina; a gaze point set unit 40 for setting a gaze point of adriver of a movable body; a trajectory set unit 50 for setting atrajectory of the movable body based on the gaze point set by the gazepoint set unit 40; and a trajectory control unit 60 for performingtrajectory control of the movable body. Each of these elements isrealized by a computer which is installed in the vehicle.

The environment information acquisition unit 10 acquires, as theenvironment information, (a) the position of an object existing aroundthe vehicle and (b) the distance of the object from the vehicle. Theobject around the vehicle includes an object that is observed by thedriver of the vehicle while the vehicle is traveling. In the presentembodiment, the object around the vehicle includes grid points set onthe road that is traveled by the vehicle. Therefore, the acquisitionunit 10 acquires the position and distance of the grid points. Further,the object such as an obstacle on the road may be included in the objectaround the vehicle.

The grid points on the traveled road are candidate points of vehicle'strajectory, that is, an expected travel locus of the vehicle. Asillustrated in FIG. 2, the grid points are arranged along a grid line Lon the traveled road in a manner that orthogonally crosses a center lineof the road at even intervals. Further, the grid line L itself is drawnon the road at even intervals as shown in FIG. 2.

The position and the distance of the grid points are acquired by, forexample, capturing an image of the road in front of the vehicle by afront camera 11 that is capable of continuously capturing a front imageof the vehicle. Based on the analysis of the front image of the vehicle,the position and distance can be acquired. Further, instead of the frontcamera 11, a millimeter-wave radar or the like may be used. Furthermore,the position of the grid points relative to the vehicle may be acquiredfrom a map database 12 that stores road map data. In this case, acurrent position of the vehicle may be determined in the first place.For the purpose of determining the current position of the vehicle, amap matching method that utilizes the map database 12 and a GPS unit 24may be used. The current position of the vehicle may also be determinedbased on the combination of road map information, the front image of thevehicle and information from the radar or the like.

The vehicle behavior acquisition unit 20 acquires information on amotion of the vehicle. The vehicle motion information includes, a speedV, a yaw rate γ and the like, respectively calculated and acquired basedon signals from a speed sensor 21 and a yaw rate sensor 22. Both of thespeed V and the yaw rate γ, or at least one of the two values, may beacquired, based on the change of the current vehicle position detectedby the GPS unit 24.

Further, the vehicle behavior acquisition unit 20 continuouslycalculates a change rate Θ of a head angle of the driver, in terms of anoscillating motion of the head of the driver, for example. That is, byemploying a driver camera 23 in the vehicle, a face image of the driveris continuously captured and the head angle of the driver iscontinuously calculated based on the analysis of the face image. Byfurther analyzing the head angle of the driver, the change rate Θ of thehead angle can be calculated.

The observed motion calculation means 30 calculates an amount of motionof the object whose position and distance are calculated by theenvironment information acquisition unit 10 (designated as an observedmotion hereinafter). More practically, the observed motion of the objectbeing projected on a retina sphere model is calculated. FIG. 3 is anillustration of the retina sphere model that approximates a retina ofthe driver. On the retina sphere, the projected position of the objectis represented by using a retina coordinate system.

The position of an image ‘a’ of an object A on the retina sphere modelcan be described by using a function (θ, φ) having an azimuth angle θand an elevation angle φ as its parameters. Then, the observed motioncalculation means 30 calculates, as the observed motion, an absolutechange rate of eccentric angle ω. The absolute value of the change rateof the eccentric angle ω is represented by an equation 1 in thefollowing. In the equation 1, the speed V of the vehicle, a distance Rof the object A, as well as a yaw rate γ, the change rate Θ of thedriver's head angle are used.

$\begin{matrix}{\overset{.}{\omega} = {{\frac{V}{R} \cdot \sqrt{1 - {\cos^{2}{\theta \cdot \cos^{2}}\varphi}}} + {\frac{\sin \; {\theta \cdot \cos}\; \varphi}{\sqrt{1 - {\cos^{2}{\theta \cdot \cos^{2}}\varphi}}}\left( {\gamma + \Theta} \right)}}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 1} \right)\end{matrix}$

The observed motion calculation means 30 thus continuously calculatesthe change rate of the eccentric angle of each of the grid points byusing the equation 1. In this case, though the environment informationacquisition unit 10 acquires the position of the object in an orthogonalcoordinate system of (x, y, z), the position in the orthogonalcoordinate system can be translated into the retina coordinate system(θ, φ) by using following equations 3 and 4. That is, the values of θand φ can be calculated by the equations 3 and 4.

The change rate Θ of the eccentric angle is calculated by using theretina sphere model. Therefore, the visual sensation of the driver isreflected by the retina sphere model. That is, in other words, theobserved motion calculation unit 30 translates the motion of the gridpoints on the road (e.g., translational motion and rotational motion) tothe motion in the visual sensation of the driver.

The equation 1 in the above description is derived in the followingmanner. The eccentric angle ω is represented by using the azimuth angleθ and the elevation angle φ as shown in an equation 2. Further, if theorthogonal coordinate system is oriented with its Y axis aligned withthe travel direction of the vehicle and with its origin having the sameposition as the retina coordinate system as shown in FIG. 3, therelationship between the angle θ, the angle φ, together with theeccentric angle ω in the retina coordinate system and the coordinates x,y, z in the orthogonal coordinate system is represented by the followingequations 3 to 7.

$\begin{matrix}{\omega = {\cos^{- 1}\left( {\cos \; {\varphi \cdot \cos}\; \theta} \right)}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 2} \right) \\{\theta = {\tan^{- 1}\left( \frac{x}{y} \right)}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 3} \right) \\{\varphi = {\tan^{- 1}\left( \frac{z}{\sqrt{x^{2} + y^{2}}} \right)}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 4} \right) \\{x = {{y \cdot \tan}\; \theta}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 5} \right) \\{y = {{R \cdot \cos}\; \omega}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 6} \right) \\{z = {{\sqrt{x^{2} + y^{2}} \cdot \tan}\; \varphi}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 7} \right)\end{matrix}$

Further, when the formula shown as an equation 8 is employed todifferentiate the equation 2, an equation 9 is derived.

$\begin{matrix}{\left( {\cos^{- 1}x} \right)^{\prime} = \frac{1}{\sqrt{1 - x^{2}}}} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 8} \right) \\\begin{matrix}{\overset{.}{\omega} = {\frac{1}{\sqrt{1 - \left( {{\cos \; \theta} - {\cos \; \varphi}} \right)^{2}}} \cdot \left( {{{- \sin}\; {\theta \cdot \cos}\; {\varphi \cdot \overset{.}{\theta}}} - {\cos \; {\theta \cdot \sin}\; {\varphi \cdot \overset{.}{\varphi}}}} \right)}} \\{= {{\frac{- \left( {\sin \; {\theta \cdot \cos}\; \varphi} \right)}{\sqrt{1 - \left( {\cos \; {\theta \cdot \cos}\; \varphi} \right)^{2}}} \cdot \overset{.}{\theta}} + {\frac{- \left( {\cos \; {\theta \cdot \sin}\; \varphi} \right)}{\sqrt{1 - \left( {\cos \; {\theta \cdot \cos}\; \varphi} \right)^{2}}} \cdot \overset{.}{\varphi}}}} \\{= {{{\alpha \left( {\theta,\varphi} \right)} \cdot \overset{.}{\theta}} + {{\beta \left( {\theta,\varphi} \right)} \cdot \overset{.}{\varphi}}}}\end{matrix} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 9} \right)\end{matrix}$

When the vehicle speed V, the yaw rate γ, the change rate Θ of thedriver's head angle are taken into consideration, the differentiatedvalues of θ and φ are calculated, based on the equations 3 and 4, asequations 10 and 11.

$\begin{matrix}\begin{matrix}{\overset{.}{\varphi} = {\frac{1}{1 + \left( \frac{z}{\sqrt{x^{2} + y^{2}}} \right)^{2}}\left( \frac{z}{\sqrt{x^{2} + y^{2}}} \right)^{\prime}}} \\{= {\frac{x^{2} + y^{2}}{x^{2} + y^{2} + z^{2}}\left\{ \frac{{- {z\left( {{x\overset{.}{x}} + {y\overset{.}{y}}} \right)}} + {\overset{.}{z}\left( {x^{2} + y^{2}} \right)}}{\left( {x^{2} + y^{2}} \right)^{\frac{3}{2}}} \right\}}} \\{= \frac{{- {zx}}\overset{.}{x}}{\left( {x^{2} + y^{2} + z^{2}} \right)\sqrt{x^{2} + y^{2}}}} \\{= {- \frac{R\; \sin \; {\varphi \cdot R}\; \cos \; \varphi \; \cos \; {\theta \cdot V}}{R^{2}R\; \cos \; \varphi}}} \\{= {{- \frac{V}{R}}\cos \; \theta \; \sin \; \varphi}}\end{matrix} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 10} \right) \\\begin{matrix}{\theta = {{\frac{1}{1 + \left( \frac{y}{x} \right)^{2}}\left( \frac{y}{x} \right)^{\prime}} + \Theta + \gamma}} \\{= {\frac{{{- \overset{.}{x}}y} + {x\overset{.}{y}}}{x^{2} + y^{2}} + \Theta + \gamma}} \\{= {\frac{{- {VR}}\; \cos \; \varphi \; \sin \; \theta}{R^{2}\cos^{2}\varphi} + \Theta + \gamma}} \\{= {\frac{{- V}\; \cos \; \theta}{R\; \cos \; \varphi} + \Theta + \gamma}}\end{matrix} & \left( {{Equation}\mspace{14mu} 11} \right)\end{matrix}$

When the equations 10 and 11 are put in the equation 9, the equation 1is derived.

The gaze point set unit 40 continuously sets the gaze point of thedriver based on the change rate of the eccentric angle of each of thegrid points calculated by the observed motion calculation unit 30. Morepractically, by finding the minimum value from among all of the absolutechange rates of the eccentric angles, the grid point having the minimumvalue of the absolute change rate is set as the gaze point.

As mentioned above, the eccentric angle change rate represents theamount of motion in the visual sensation. Further, based onpsychological theories and other findings as well as empiricalknowledge, the driver is known to gaze at a point that least moves inhis/her sight. Further, the driver is assumed to gaze at somewhere onthe road while he/she is driving a vehicle. Therefore, the observedmotion, that is, the amount of motion in the visual sensation, is, andshould be, minimized at a certain point on the road in the sight of thedriver where he/she is “gazing,” that is, where his/her gaze stays. Thatis, using a point that has the minimum absolute change rate of theeccentric angle as the gaze point is a reasonable assumption.

FIG. 4 is an illustration of the eccentric angle change rates of gridpoints, each of which represented by a segment having a proportionallength. As shown in the illustration, the grid points in the lowerportion (i.e., a near side relative to the vehicle) have larger changerates, and the grid points in the upper portion (i.e., a far siderelative to the vehicle) have smaller change rates. The gaze point isset at a point in the upper right position, a so-called “exit” of thecorner, or, the curved road.

The trajectory set unit 50 determines a grid point, in each of the gridlines, having the minimum eccentric angle change rate, in the absolutevalue. Then, by connecting the minimum change rate grid points and thegaze point set by the gaze point set unit 40, an expected travel locusof the vehicle, that is, a “trajectory” of the vehicle, is drawn. InFIG. 5, the grid points having the minimum change rate are representedby a figure of white square □ in the illustration, and the gaze point isrepresented by a figure of black circle  in the illustration. Thetravel locus of the vehicle can be drawn by connecting those figures.

In this case, the change rate of the eccentric angle is originallycalculated in the retina coordinate system, the change rate istranslated to the orthogonal coordinate system for the purpose ofplotting in the illustration by using the equations 5 to 7. FIG. 6 showsthe trajectory after translation into the orthogonal coordinate system.

The trajectory control unit 60 sets, while defining a target trajectorybeing set by the trajectory set unit 50, a current trajectory based onthe current travel condition of the vehicle. Then, based on thecomparison between the current trajectory and the target trajectory, thecontrol unit 60 controls the trajectory of the vehicle so that thecurrent trajectory approximates the target trajectory.

The current trajectory is set based on a current steering angle of thesteering wheel as well as the yaw rate and the like, that is, based onthe condition representing the current steering condition of thevehicle, assuming that the current steering condition is kept intact forthe time being. Alternatively, the current trajectory may be set as anextension of the preceding trajectory. The trajectory control isperformed by changing the steering characteristics of the vehicle. Thetrajectory control may be performed by assisting the steering operationof the steering wheel.

The steering characteristics can be changed by changing the front-rearload balance of the vehicle. The load balance may be shifted frontwardfor the improved steering characteristics. Therefore, as shown in FIG.7A, the curvature radius of the current trajectory being greater thanthe target trajectory may be adjusted by shifting the load toward thefront of the vehicle. On the other hand, if the load balance is shiftedbackward, the stability of the vehicle is improved. That is, as shown inFIG. 7B, the curvature radius of the current trajectory being smallerthan the target trajectory may be adjusted by shifting the load towardthe rear of the vehicle. Further, the load balance may be shifted byother methods well-known in the art. That is, for example, the loadbalance may be shifted by controlling the driving force and the brakingforce, or by managing stability factors or the like.

Further, when the steering operation is assisted, the vehicle behavioris predicted based on the current trajectory, with the yaw rate and thesteering assist torque carefully under control for realizing the targettrajectory and matching of the predicted vehicle behavior with the oneon the target trajectory.

As stated above in detail, the observed motion of the object iscalculated as the change rate of the eccentric angle of the observedobject projected on the retina sphere model in the present embodiment.Therefore, the actually gazed point on the road is accuratelyapproximated by the gaze point set by the gaze point set unit. Thereason for achieving the accuracy of the approximation is that theamount of the observed motion of the object is translated to the amountof measurement in the visual sensation physically modeled according to abody structure of the driver.

Then, the travel locus of the vehicle, or the trajectory, is setaccording to the gaze point calculated in the above-described manner.Therefore, the trajectory realized by the travel support apparatus issufficiently close to the trajectory that is realized by theself-steering of the driver. As a result, the driver of the vehicle isprevented from having discomfort or unsafe feeling when the trajectorycontrol is performed by using the target trajectory set in theabove-described manner.

Although the present disclosure has been fully described in connectionwith preferred embodiment thereof with reference to the accompanyingdrawings, it is to be noted that various changes and modifications willbecome apparent to those skilled in the art.

For example, the gaze point is calculated based on the change rate ofthe eccentric angle in the above embodiment. However, the gaze point maybe calculated based on the face image captured by the driver camera 23and the analysis of the face image in terms of the position of the irisof the eye.

Further, the motion of the object is represented as a vector in theimage captured by the camera 11, that is, the motion is calculated as anoptical flow, and the gaze point of the driver may be set at the minimumoptical flow point. In this case, the optical flow may only becalculated for the points on the road as is the case in the aboveembodiment.

Furthermore, the following scheme may be used for the pre-calculation ofthe gaze point. That is, the navigation system usually predicts thevehicle speed V in the course of calculation of the guidance route.Therefore, the predicted vehicle speed V is used together with the roadshape stored in the navigation system and the yaw rate derived therefromfor the calculation of the change rate of the eccentric angle in theequation 1. In this case, the change rate Θ of the head angle of thedriver may be predictably calculated based on an assumption that thedriver's head angle is identical with the traveling direction of thevehicle, or on an assumption that the driver's head angle is directedtoward a point ahead on the guidance route. Likewise, the change rate ofthe eccentric angle of each of the grid points may be calculated in apredictable manner, and the predicted change rate may be used tocalculate the trajectory of the vehicle. Further, the driver's headangle as well as the change rate Θ of the head angle may be calculatedwhen the trajectory of the vehicle is calculated during the travel ofthe vehicle. Furthermore, the gaze point as well as the change rate ofthe eccentric angle of the vehicle may be calculated based oninformation derived from an external information provider.

Furthermore, the blind spot in the retina of the driver may beconsidered when calculating the gaze point and the trajectory. That is,for example, if the driver has a blind spot that can be mapped inhis/her sight as shown in FIG. 8, the minimum change rate of theeccentric angle in the absolute value is searched for in ablind-spot-excluded area in the sight of the driver. In the illustrationin FIG. 8, a new gaze point is found in the blind-spot-excluded areathat is outside of the mapping of the blind spot of the driver. Further,in each of the grid lines, the grid point having the minimum eccentricangle change rate is searched for by excluding, from the search area, anarea that corresponds to the blind spot of the driver. The exclusion ofthe blind spot may be based on a position of the blind spot that isinput by the driver him/herself.

Furthermore, in the above embodiment, the trajectory control isperformed based on the comparison between the target trajectory and thecurrent trajectory. However, the consciousness determination may beperformed based on the comparison of the trajectories. The consciousnessdetermination may be performed by determining that, when the differencebetween the target trajectory and the current trajectory is large, thedegree of consciousness is low, for example. Further, if the degree ofconsciousness is low, the driver of the vehicle may be warned.

Furthermore, the target trajectory may simply be displayed on a displayunit such as a headup display or the like, without performing thetrajectory control and determining the consciousness.

Furthermore, the trajectory may be set based on the vehicle position andthe gaze point without calculating the trajectory candidate points onthe grid lines, instead of calculating the eccentric angle change ratefor all of the grid points on the grid lines as described in the aboveembodiment. That is, only by determining the vehicle position and thegaze point, the trajectory of the vehicle can be drawn based on thecurvature radius according to the curvature of the road (e.g., accordingto the curvature of a center line of the road), for example, withoutcalculating the change rate of the eccentric angle of each of the gridpoints on the grid lines. To the contrary, the trajectory of the vehiclemay be determined only by calculating the change rate of the eccentricangle of the grid points without setting the gaze point. That is, onlyby setting “trajectory points” on the grid lines based on the eccentricangle change rates, the trajectory of the vehicle can be set.

Furthermore, in the above embodiment, the automotive vehicle is used asan example of implementation object of the present disclosure. However,other type of vehicles such as an aircraft, a motorcycle, a wheelchairand the like may also be considered as the implementation object of thepresent disclosure.

Such changes, modifications, and summarized scheme are to be understoodas being within the scope of the present disclosure as defined byappended claims.

1. A travel support apparatus comprising: a gaze point set unit forsetting a gaze point of a driver of a movable body; and a trajectory setunit for setting a trajectory of the movable body based on the gazepoint set by the gaze point set unit.
 2. A travel support apparatuscomprising: a position acquisition unit for acquiring, as environmentinformation, a position of an object existing at a proximity of amovable body; a motion acquisition unit for acquiring, as motioninformation, a motion of the movable body; an observed motioncalculation unit for calculating, based on a retina sphere model thatmodels a retina of a driver of the movable body together with theenvironment information and motion information, observed motionrepresentative of motion information of the object being projected ontothe retina; and a trajectory set unit for setting a trajectory of themovable body based on the observed motion.
 3. The travel supportapparatus of claim 1, wherein the position acquisition unit and themotion acquisition unit of claim 2 are respectively included, and thegaze point set unit sets the gaze point of the driver based on theenvironment information acquired by the position information unit andthe motion information of the movable body acquired by the motionacquisition unit.
 4. The travel support apparatus of claim 3, whereinthe observed motion calculation unit of claim 2 is included, and thegaze point set unit sets the gaze point of the driver based on theobserved motion calculated by the observed motion calculation unit. 5.The travel support apparatus of claim 4, wherein the movable bodytravels on a road, the observed motion calculation unit calculatesobserved motions of multiple points on the road traveled by the movablebody, and the gaze point set unit sets, as the gaze point, a minimummotion point that minimizes the observed motion from among the multiplepoints on the road.
 6. The travel support apparatus of claim 1, whereina driver camera for capturing the driver of the movable body is includedto capture a driver image of the driver that at least includes an imageof an eye of the driver, and the gaze point set unit sets the gaze pointby analyzing the driver image captured by the driver camera.
 7. Thetravel support apparatus of claim 1, wherein a front camera forcapturing a front image in a travel direction of the movable body isdisposed on the movable body, and the gaze point set unit sets the gazepoint based on an optical flow in the front image captured by the frontcamera.
 8. The travel support apparatus of claim 5, wherein the observedmotion calculation unit calculates the observed motion, for each ofmultiple grid points, by drawing grid lines on the traveled roadorthogonally in a crossing manner at preset intervals, the grid linesformed by the multiple grid points respectively serving as trajectorycandidate points, and the trajectory set unit connects the gaze pointand minimum motion grid points that are determined, on each of the gridlines, to have minimum observed motion to set the trajectory of themovable body.
 9. The travel support apparatus of claim 1 furthercomprising a trajectory control unit for performing trajectory controlof the movable body by comparing a target trajectory of the movable bodyset by the trajectory set unit with a current trajectory calculatedbased on a current condition of the movable body.
 10. The travel supportapparatus of claim 9, wherein the movable body has a front wheel and arear wheel, and the trajectory control unit shifts a load balancebetween the front wheel and the rear wheel for performing the trajectorycontrol of the movable body.
 11. The travel support apparatus of claim9, wherein the trajectory control unit changes a steering assist torquefor performing the trajectory control.
 12. The travel support apparatusof claim 1 further comprising a consciousness determination unit isprovided so as to perform consciousness determination of the driver ofthe movable body by comparing a target trajectory of the movable bodyset by the trajectory set unit and a current trajectory calculated basedon a current condition of the movable body.
 13. The travel supportapparatus of claim 2, wherein the observed motion calculation unitcalculates the observed motion in an area that excludes a blind spot inthe retina of the driver of the movable body.